![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Hiking Proxy Falls
Jul. 11th, 2025 07:54 amOregon Cascades Travelog #10
Blue Lake, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 5:30pm
After hiking Downing Creek Falls earlier this afternoon we drove back up toward the Santiam Pass then south down the McKenzie River canyon. We passed a few signs for waterfalls along the way and sped past them at 60mph, confident they weren't interesting. (Ironic foreshadowing: they were totally interesting. We'd have to come back for them!) We turned west, heading back uphill along Old McKenzie, and reached the trailhead for Proxy Falls.
The Proxy Falls trail is a loop with spurs off to two waterfalls, Lower and Upper Proxy Falls. We quickly found that our AllTrails.com map was out to lunch. It showed the first part of the trail as being downhill. You can see in the pic above that it's decided uphill. We huffed and puffed up a ridge of volcanic rubble.
Just as we were running out of steam the trail leveled off. Soon enough we reached the spur for the first falls.
The spur trail led to a partial view of Lower Proxy Falls. Much of the Falls, especially its base, was shrouded by dense trees down in the canyon. The trail seemed to peter out here. Keyword: seemed.
We paced back and forth a bit, peering down the little ridge we were on to see if there'd been a washout or slide that obscured the trail. Sure enough, there had been. We could see remnants of a trail at the bottom of the hill. We picked our way carefully down the hillside, then balanced on and climbed over the trunks of huge fallen trees across the bottom of the canyon until we reached the foot of Lower Proxy Falls.
To really get the best view of the falls we had to walk out into the middle of the creek. At first I hesitated as I was wearing my hiking sandals instead of my boots. Boots would let me step through a few inches of water without getting my socks wet. But I deemed that the weather was warm enough to deal with wet feet, plus what's beauty without a little discomfort? 😅 We walked into the creek and got our feet wet.
Once we were satisfied drinking in the view of the falls and soaking our feet in chilly water we scrambled across the big logs (much bigger than those you see in the photos above!) to the bottom of the hill opposite the falls. We picked a different route to the top, looking to save ourselves a few steps. I took a small spill on the way up. Again, what's beauty without a bit of discomfort. 🤣
At the top of the hill we met a pair of hikers looking for the falls. We told them about our cross-country, wet-foot expedition, and they basically said, "Yeah, no." In fact I think those were their exact words: "Yeah, no." 🤣
Fine by me if they choose to stay on the bunny trail. Me? In beauty I walk.
Keep reading: These were Lower Proxy Falls; next we visit Upper Proxy Falls!
Blue Lake, OR - Wed, 2 Jul 2025, 5:30pm
After hiking Downing Creek Falls earlier this afternoon we drove back up toward the Santiam Pass then south down the McKenzie River canyon. We passed a few signs for waterfalls along the way and sped past them at 60mph, confident they weren't interesting. (Ironic foreshadowing: they were totally interesting. We'd have to come back for them!) We turned west, heading back uphill along Old McKenzie, and reached the trailhead for Proxy Falls.
The Proxy Falls trail is a loop with spurs off to two waterfalls, Lower and Upper Proxy Falls. We quickly found that our AllTrails.com map was out to lunch. It showed the first part of the trail as being downhill. You can see in the pic above that it's decided uphill. We huffed and puffed up a ridge of volcanic rubble.
Just as we were running out of steam the trail leveled off. Soon enough we reached the spur for the first falls.
The spur trail led to a partial view of Lower Proxy Falls. Much of the Falls, especially its base, was shrouded by dense trees down in the canyon. The trail seemed to peter out here. Keyword: seemed.
We paced back and forth a bit, peering down the little ridge we were on to see if there'd been a washout or slide that obscured the trail. Sure enough, there had been. We could see remnants of a trail at the bottom of the hill. We picked our way carefully down the hillside, then balanced on and climbed over the trunks of huge fallen trees across the bottom of the canyon until we reached the foot of Lower Proxy Falls.
To really get the best view of the falls we had to walk out into the middle of the creek. At first I hesitated as I was wearing my hiking sandals instead of my boots. Boots would let me step through a few inches of water without getting my socks wet. But I deemed that the weather was warm enough to deal with wet feet, plus what's beauty without a little discomfort? 😅 We walked into the creek and got our feet wet.
Once we were satisfied drinking in the view of the falls and soaking our feet in chilly water we scrambled across the big logs (much bigger than those you see in the photos above!) to the bottom of the hill opposite the falls. We picked a different route to the top, looking to save ourselves a few steps. I took a small spill on the way up. Again, what's beauty without a bit of discomfort. 🤣
At the top of the hill we met a pair of hikers looking for the falls. We told them about our cross-country, wet-foot expedition, and they basically said, "Yeah, no." In fact I think those were their exact words: "Yeah, no." 🤣
Fine by me if they choose to stay on the bunny trail. Me? In beauty I walk.
Keep reading: These were Lower Proxy Falls; next we visit Upper Proxy Falls!
